In December 2021, Google made an announcement at The Game Awards that the company would soon bring Android games to Windows. This promise has now come to fruition, albeit to a very limited audience. Google released a trailer just a couple of days ago with the news; check it out below.
The company behind Android said in the announcement, “In December, we announced that Google Play Games will be coming to PCs, to meet players where they are and give them access to their games on as many devices as possible. Today, we are opening sign-ups to Google Play Games as a beta starting in Korea, Taiwan, and Hong Kong.” Google went on to inform players, “To sign up for future announcements, or to access the beta in Korea, Taiwan, and Hong Kong, please go to g.co/googleplaygames.”
Gamers have long been able to play Android games on PC with the help of projects like Android x86 and Bluestacks. However, Google now supporting the mobile games will make it much easier. Google has added Android games to Windows with the use of the Android app layer that is built into Windows 11, this allows Android apps to be easily used on Windows.
Google has said the addition of Android games on Windows will allow people to “play a catalog of Google Play games on… Windows PC via a standalone application built by Google.” The company also said it’s “excited to announce that some of the most popular mobile games in the world will be available at launch, including Mobile Legends: Bang Bang, Summoners War, State of Survival: The Joker Collaboration, and Three Kingdoms Tactics.”
While Android games on PC are only available to a limited amount of countries and through a beta sign-up, below is a list of minimum requirements that Google says gamers will need:
- Windows 10 (v2004)
- Solid state drive (SSD)
- Gaming-class GPU
- 8 logical cores of CPU
- 8 GB of RAM
- 20 GB of available storage space
- Windows admin account
- Hardware virtualization must be turned on
- Compatible PC device and configuration
Google has promised to expand to more regions later this year. Stay tuned for future developments.